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<title>Change Your Life (Make It Yours) by FiresFromOurHearts</title>
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<h1><a href="https://archiveofourown.org/works/27166474">Change Your Life (Make It Yours)</a> by <a class='authorlink' href='https://archiveofourown.org/users/FiresFromOurHearts/pseuds/FiresFromOurHearts'>FiresFromOurHearts</a></h1>

<table class="full">

<tr><td><b>Series:</b></td><td>Naruto Prompts [1]</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Category:</b></td><td>Naruto</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Genre:</b></td><td>Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, BAMF Uzumaki Mito, Badass Women, Founders Week 2020, Gen, Listen sometimes you need to go on a road trip, Sometimes that involves you or you and a friend, Time Travel, Uzumaki Clan Worldbuilding, Warring States Period (Naruto), Why repeat a life that wasn't fantastic, Worldbuilding, and sometimes it involves you and your new friend the bijū, listen, sometimes you have to make your life about you</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Language:</b></td><td>English</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Status:</b></td><td>Completed</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Published:</b></td><td>2020-10-23</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Updated:</b></td><td>2020-10-23</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Packaged:</b></td><td>2021-05-20 10:21:53</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Rating:</b></td><td>General Audiences</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Warnings:</b></td><td>No Archive Warnings Apply</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Chapters:</b></td><td>1</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Words:</b></td><td>2,086</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Publisher:</b></td><td>archiveofourown.org</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Story URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/works/27166474</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Author URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/users/FiresFromOurHearts/pseuds/FiresFromOurHearts</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Summary:</b></td><td><div class="userstuff">
              <p>Mito does not know how, or why, she finds herself back in the past before she married Hashirama. And though Mito had lived a good life, she doesn't think she wants to relive it. And so, when the Senju Clan reaches out for an alliance Mito does not step forward and volunteer. Instead, she suggests they do something else that no one has ever done before - build a village.</p><p>Day 1 of Founders Week: <b>Time Travel</b> | <s>Hashirama's Birthday</s></p>
            </div></td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Relationships:</b></td><td>Uzumaki Mito &amp; Original Character(s), Uzumaki Mito &amp; Uzumaki Clan, Uzumaki Mito/Hashirama Senju (past)</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Series:</b></td><td>Naruto Prompts [1]</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Series URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/series/1982980</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Comments:</b></td><td>8</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Kudos:</b></td><td>55</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Collections:</b></td><td>Founders Week 2020</td></tr>

</table>

<a name="section0001"><h2>Change Your Life (Make It Yours)</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>Mito is on her deathbed and it is nothing like she ever thought it would be. She’s not on a battlefield, not dying in protection of her people. She is dying of old age, in bed, alone with the ghosts of her family waiting for her to join them.</p><p>The walls around her are almost bare. There are a few pictures hanging up, two carefully placed on a nearby table. For the most part, a painting is the best feature of the room—one of the ocean; a reminder of Uzushio, <em>(of why she is doing this)</em>.</p><p>She shuts her eyes against the world around her, leaving herself in darkness. The blanket feels heavy and she feels her frailty like never before. Alone, a relic of an era long past, Mito breathes her last.</p><p>Then she inhales, the gasp catching in her throat, and she chokes, eyes watering. Still, she forces her eyes open, utterly confused because she had died, she’s sure of it. The world around her, however, is nothing like the one she left behind. She’s no longer in her bedroom, and when she looks around, she can’t see the walls of Konoha. She can’t even sense Hashirama’s forest anymore.</p><p>Mito stumbles to her feet. And there is strength in her bones now. She looks at her hands, notes the lack of wrinkles and calluses that come from weapons rather than from writing seals. These are the hands of a woman left to the past. One that didn’t spend years in Konoha acting as an advisor and no longer a ninja, forgotten by the vast majority of Konoha’s citizens.</p><p>There’s a window where Mito is, and it looks out to the beach. A familiar beach. This is the place of Mito’s birth. The Uzumaki Clan Compound on the western island of Uzu no Kuni. This is the place she had left behind after being betrothed to Hashirama. <em>This</em> is a place Mito had left at seventeen and never returned to.</p><p>But Mito is here now, somehow, against the odds. She is here and she is young. There’s a scar missing from her left arm that she had gotten at sixteen, but a scar on her leg means she’s older than fourteen. Fifteen, most likely.</p><p>A life stretches out before her, a long one that’s occasionally lonely. One full of hardship and being trapped behind walls, relegated to a protector’s position, <em>(and Mito has always been a fighter first rather than a protector; she would fight in the name of her people, but she had sharpened her skills so she could fight not remain behind in case of an emergency attack)</em>. Mito could live the same life, make the same decisions, and go through life. She could live until she was old and frail. But…</p><p>
  <em>(Mito had lived a good life. A happy one, despite the trials she faced and the wars she had silently suffered through. But Mito also died giving a child a burden she had carried—a creature of rage and hatred and anger. And, in her worst moments, Mito had thought the creature’s emotions had been justified, because they had taken the creature’s freedom… Like how she had given hers up to the Senju Clan.)</em>
</p><p>This is a second chance. Mito doesn’t have to relive the life she has lived. She doesn’t have to repeat the same mistakes, make the same choices. Mito had loved Hashirama, even if his clan had taken her freedom, but she had loved a man she had buried. Mito’s family has been gone for years now, <em>(and Uzushio had risen and the Uzumaki had joined and Mito had never been given the chance to see it)</em>, and left her with ghosts and memories that were blurry.</p><p>There’s nothing in Mito urging her towards where the Uchiha and Senju Clans wage war. Perhaps that makes Mito a bad person, a selfish one if nothing else, but Mito is a kunoichi. Last time, Mito had volunteered to take the place of Asa, Clan Heir, as decoy.</p><p>
  <em>(The Uzumaki Clan has supported their main line for years. This means protecting them in a world full of assassins for hire. Decoys are a common practice. Two or three children trained alongside the Clan Heir to take their place for long-term plans or on day-to-day basis. It helps that nothing really separates the Clan Heir from the rest of the Uzumaki Clan aside from their family and extra classes.)</em>
</p><p>As the sun rises, Mito looks out at the ocean and promises herself that she will not waste her time reliving a life left behind.</p>
<hr/><p>She’s a week away from her sixteenth birthday when the decoys and Asa are rounded up for a meeting. Previously, she hadn’t remembered the time leading up to the meeting. Didn’t really remember the meeting itself. Just the basics she’d put together afterward, and her own voice, loud and clear, ‘I volunteer’.</p><p>In the days leading up, she doesn’t realise what’s coming. She just lives her life. She spends three days a week with her family, out in the fishing boats, hauling nets in and casting them out. She spends another three days training, either as Asa or as a decoy, and the final day is her one day of rest.</p><p>Then, they’re called together and Mito knows. It’s a realisation that feels accompanied by a thunderclap. A sound that shakes her to her bones. It’s a small group, <em>(same as last time)</em>, just the decoys, Asa, and the Uzumaki Clan Head.</p><p>“The Senju Clan has reached out to us for an alliance,” the Clan Head says, tone serious. “They wish to expand their trade using our network across the sea and our ports. In return, they offer resources and aid should we need it.” The Clan Head crosses her arms and surveys the group with steely eyes. “It is likely we will be offering an alliance guaranteed through marriage.”</p><p>In another life, Mito had volunteered. Given up her life with the clan for the Senju Clan. Because the Senju Clan were tied to the Uzumaki Clan, family in legends and in myths—and that means something. They are bound by honour to help each other, <em>(but they are all ninjas, in the end)</em>.</p><p>“But,” Mito says, fifteen and not volunteering and changing her life, “do we need to offer them someone?” And this isn’t the start of the world changing, but it <em>is</em> the start of Mito’s life changing. This is a new path, and one that she has chosen.</p><p>The Uzumaki Clan Head meets Mito’s eyes, and she doesn’t back down, <em>(widow of the Shodaime Hokage, protector of the Senju Clan, jinchūriki of the Kyūbi, kunoichi)</em>. The Uzumaki Clan don’t need the Senju Clan, nor do they owe the Senju Clan anything. There’s no other idea in Mito’s head, no plan with fences barricading her in. There’s no single road, just untravelled sea with all its dangers and beauties. “Wouldn’t it make more sense to reach out to the surrounding clans?” She asks, <em>(asks instead of talking about a life lived well but lived alone, a life lived well but lived in boredom, a life lived well but a death ill-suited to one who had been a ninja)</em>.</p><p>After all, the Uzumaki Clan lives in the west of Uzu no Kuni. There are a number of smaller clans scattered around, but also two bigger ones. They don’t fight—Uzu no Kuni is safe from the wars fought over in the mainland. There are, occasionally, squabbles over resources and missions, but they’ve built an economy on trading with one another rather than warring with each other. Their strength is bought by those living outside Uzu no Kuni, and internal fighting isn’t a great way to have people hear about you. Ultimately, Uzu no Kuni is too small to have the number of missions that the clans would require, and to have their names known outside of Uzu no Kuni requires them to be known, not embroiled in clan wars.</p><p>Asa, standing beside Mito, wraps an arm around Mito’s shoulder and tugs her friend closer. “It does sound like a better way to build up our strength,” she agrees. “The Senju Clan offers nothing we need, resource-wise. And whilst their aid might be valuable, they are also too far away to come quickly. Besides, they’re caught up in their own wars. Who says they will be able to spare anyone?”</p><p>“This is not an alliance to turn aside easily,” the Uzumaki Clan Head warns, but her arms are uncrossed now. She looks more relaxed, <em>(and—for the first time—Mito thinks how the Uzumaki Clan Head had given up one of her daughters, for they are all daughters of the clan, for an alliance that proved itself useless; she wonders how it felt, whether it kept the Clan Head up at night)</em>.</p><p>“Maybe not,” one of the other decoys, Aiko, says. “But Mito’s idea makes more sense. If we reach out to those surrounding us, we could even create stronger ties for Uzu no Kuni and unite our country entirely.”</p><p>“That,” the Uzumaki Clan Head says gravely, “would place a rather large target on our backs.”</p><p>“But we’d also be stronger,” Asa says, and all of them are firmly on Mito’s side now—even Michi who has yet to speak. “And you’ve been talking about how change is coming to us considering the growing battles in Hi no Kuni and the eruptions in Mizu no Kuni. Maybe we should be the ones to change first.”</p><p>“The Mizushima Clan is likely to meet with us,” Michi points out, finally speaking. “They’re often dealing with pirates, primarily abolishing the attempted slave trade and related fūinjutsu. We already deal with them for sea trades, but this would be something that strengthens both of our clans.”</p><p>“What are you suggesting? I’m hearing ideas of multiple alliances, but this doesn’t quite seem to be what you have in mind.”</p><p>
  <em>(Mito was once a child where ninja villages did not exist and the very idea seemed impossible. But Mito is no longer a child who hadn’t even thought of ninja villages, let alone dreamt of them. She is a kunoichi who had helped build one, and had lived in it and seen it grow over generations.)</em>
</p><p>The other three Uzumakis seem unsure now. They have ideas but don’t understand how they work together. That’s alright though, they’re young. There’s no doubt in Mito’s mind that they will help shape the village-that-will-be, but Mito will start the idea for them.</p><p>“A village,” she says. “A village for all the clans where we can share missions for those most suited and keep our people safe altogether.”</p><p>It seems impossible. The very idea even causes a surprised expression to cross the Clan Head’s face, and Mito’s never seen their Clan Head seem surprised. “That’s different,” she says, after a considerable length of time has passed.</p><p>
  <em>(Different, she says, but not impossible. Nothing is impossible, and the Uzumaki Clan know that better than most. One could even say they specialise in the impossible.)</em>
</p><p>Mito had never gotten to see Uzushio born. She had only heard stories of how it happened, only read words in letters detailing the alliances and the seals and everything else. This time, Mito will see Uzushio born, <em>(and she will see the village that should’ve been hers by blood, but had never seen because she had married into the Senju Clan and left the Uzumaki behind)</em>. This time things will be different.</p><p>
  <em>(And, when the Uzumaki Clan sends out messengers to the other clans of Uzu no Kuni, Mito is not among them. Maybe Mito started it all this time, but she is not the only one looking for a better future. The Uzumakis around her rise to the occasion; Aiko, Michi, and Asa taking key positions as decoys and Clan Heir. Mito, on the other hand, turns her gaze elsewhere. There’s a world out there she never got to explore and now her chance. She’ll finally live for herself and no one else.)</em>
</p><p>
  <em>(This world will not be like the one Mito left behind. Its future will never be the same—no one’s will be. Uzushio will never fall, instead anchored to seals in a pocket dimension. The fact that it’s located on the back of a bijū probably has something to do with it. But that’s in the future after Mito befriends a bijū. First? First, she has to find herself.)</em>
</p>
  </div><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_foot_notes"><b>Author's Note:</b><blockquote class="userstuff"><p>This is not very long so I didn't really get to go into depth in relation to the whole decoy thing. But, basically, the idea in this is that Mito isn't the Uzumaki princess or anything. Rather, she's a stand-in, a copy, someone who isn't royalty but fakes it well enough that the Senju Clan takes her rather than the actual princess (Asa). There are two other decoys here: Aiko and Michi. Similarly, Ashina is the decoy for the Uzumaki Clan Head. </p><p>I don't have too much to say about this, though it was fun to write. I enjoyed having Mito decide she wanted to control her own life and enjoy it and it's definitely not a normal time travel plot, I guess, since Mito doesn't even try to repeat her past (why would she?). Ultimately, Mito's not sure what she wants to do in her life, except for not relive the same thing. Maybe she'll get herself a new perspective. A new experience. She definitely goes and befriends a bijū and no one can stop her, but I didn't feel like writing that so here we are. </p><p>Anyway, thank you for reading! Also shout out to  <a href="https://archiveofourown.org/users/SilverUtahraptor">SilverUtahraptor</a>. who told me about Founders week and is definitely the reason why I wrote anything for it. Feel free to find me on <a href="https://silent-silver-slip.tumblr.com/">tumblr</a> if you want, but otherwise, thanks for giving this a go!</p></blockquote></div></div>
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